On "The Negotiation"

It was a pleasure viewing Azin Feizabadi's work in class last night. 

A few thoughts came to mind on my commute home regarding The Negotiation. 

I would have liked to ask what degree of influence did Lars von Trier's Dogville {2003} have on the formal development, both in terms of Brechtian mise en scene,

and the use of V.O. which I thought mirrored {rather effectively} von Trier's approach.

The detached omniscience of the V.O. narrator in this case, most concerned with form and the arc of classical story construction, implies a future position looking back; the pendulum of humankind, the rise and fall inherent to the histoire{s} of social movements {or attitudes} as seen through Neo-Platonic macrocosm. 

The V.O. is the most closed element of Feizabadi's piece as it introduces a position rooted in an acceptance of the overarching inevitability of political flux,  its actors interchangeable, the reorganization of social hierarchy ever so slight. 
In other words, the narrator's knowledge {abeit didactic} of humankind's {Sisyphean?} tendency to initiate upheaval, yet favor stability {the core tenet of classical narrative structure}. 


Through the use of video diptych, we as audience/active spectator find ourselves placed in-between the conversation among archetypal choreographers of radical conflict. This I feel is the essential component of the work {especially in its original installation form} as we can then tangibly participate in the fertile, intertwined dialectic between peace and bloodshed, love and war,  aspiration and futility.

For once possibility trumps political statement.

Leif Huron
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